Manny Ramirez: After going 1-for-7 in the first two games, breaks 2-2 tie with two-run double and finishes 2-for-3 with three RBI and a run scored.

WHO'S NOT

Edward Mujica: First Padres reliever to allow a run this season, giving up three on four hits and two walks in 1 1/3 innings.

BY THE NUMBERS

1: Major league hit by Everth Cabrera, a double to left center in the seventh.

3: Straight walks issued by Dodgers starter Chad Billingsley in the fifth, leading to two Padres runs without the aid of a hit.

The Padres already knew that their third baseman, Kevin Kouzmanoff, lacks the agility of an NFL cornerback, even if he is the son of a former NFL linebacker.

They also knew that when Dodger slugger Manny Ramirez socks a baseball, it usually goes far, even in Petco Park on a chilly night.

Baseball being baseball, those diverse realities showed up on consecutive plays Wednesday night with the score tied in the seventh inning.

The Padres were left exasperated and, in the end, defeated, 5-2, before an announced crowd of 31,700.

Kouzmanoff was crouched near third base when the Dodgers' Orlando Hudson blooped Edward Mujica's pitch as baserunner Rafael Furcal raced toward second base with none out.

Like a cornerback must on the fade route, Kouzmanoff was required to pivot, retreat some 20 feet and flag down a ball over his shoulder. He strained mightily, but was denied a spectacular play by inches, which brought up Ramirez with none out and speedy runners on first and second.

Ramirez followed with a rocket to Petco Park's massive right-center, where Brian Giles has tracked down scores of deep drives that die in the coastal air. But this one went about five feet past his outstretched glove for a two-run double and a 4-2 deficit.

“I'm playing in there a little to have a chance at home (or third) if there's a hard ground ball,” the right fielder said. “Manny hit it well.

“He's got power to all fields. It wasn't a high, towering shot. It was more of a line drive. That's what you've got to do here. Keep it low and hopefully hit it over everybody's head.”

Ramirez hit two home runs in a game at Petco last summer, part of his 14 RBI in nine games against the Padres.

That Ramirez's drive Wednesday night came against the rookie Mujica, rather than sidewinder Cla Meredith, was a story in itself. As Ramirez approached the batter's box, Meredith ran from the bullpen to the infield, believing Black had summoned him to face Ramirez.

Black actually was waving his infielders to the mound, so Meredith trotted back to the bullpen. He returned later in the inning and struck out his first batter, then gave up an RBI single to James Loney.

The game will be remembered vividly by Pades pitcher Walter Silva and shortstop Everth Cabrera, both making their major league debuts.

Silva, a 32-year-old who had pitched several years in Mexico's summer and winter leagues, gave up a run in the first and another in the second but handed a 2-2 score to Mujica entering the sixth. He threw 94 pitches, walked four and struck out one.

“My legs were shaking a little bit,” said Silva, who became the No. 3 starter after Cha Seung Baek went onto the disabled list. “I'm thinking, 'Man, I'm here.' First inning, I was kind of nervous. Then I got into the game. But I threw a lot of pitches, more pitches than I wanted. Overall, feel happy.”

A season ago, Cabrera was thinking big even as he played for the Asheville Tourists, a low Single-A team of the Rockies. “I watch big league games,” he said. “I paid attention and I said, 'I could do that.'”

Cabrera, drafted out of Colorado's system last December, made four assists and four putouts Wednesday night, and reprised none of his overly hasty miscues of spring training. Batting eighth, the speedy switch-hitter grounded out, drew a walk and, with two outs in the seventh, hit a left-handed double to left-center off reliever Cory Wade.

“I was happy because I knew when I hit it, it was a double,” he said. He smiled and added: “I thought triple, but there was no chance.”